1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a process for producing a baked product featuring exposed cream cheese, and to the product produced by the process. When served bite-sized, the product fills a special niche in the fast food or convenient food industry--the product is nutritious, natural, convenient, and can compete with theater snacks such as popcorn or nachos.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
A bagel, as it has been known for hundreds of years, is a toroidally shaped dough product. The dough is worked on a flour board and set in a warm place to rise, then kneaded again before being formed into rings. The rings are formed from balls of raised dough, either by poking a hole through the center of each ball or by rolling each ball into a long strip, shaping the strip into a ring, and then pressing the ends together.
An important step in the traditional bagel making process is boiling the yeast dough in water in order to close the pores of the dough to form a skin. Boiling is followed by baking in a hot oven to turn the crust golden brown. A hard outer crust and soft chewy inner crumb portion combine to provide a distinctive "bagel" taste and feel.
A favorite way of enjoying bagels is to slice them in half, and spread a topping, such as cream cheese, on the cut surfaces. Bagels are characteristically cut open by slicing them across their width on a plane perpendicular to the axis of the toroid, and a topping such as cream cheese is then spread on the slices. Because of the hard crust, the cutting process requires a sharp knife, which can be hazardous. Further, due to the soft crumb interior, a slightly dull knife will crush the hard crust into the soft crumb interior, compacting the interior, which detracts from appearance and taste. Moreover, such planar cut is typically awkward and does not result in two planar halves.
Spreading the cream cheese on the bagel may also be tedious as the cream cheese is stored in a refrigerator and is very viscous until it warms. Because of the complex final food preparation steps, traditional bagels cannot be considered convenience or snack foods for consumption, e.g., in automobiles, while hiking, or in movie theaters.
It is known to include certain flavorings or fillers on or in bagel dough, such as unions, poppy seeds, salt, or raisins. These are materials which have substantially the same handling characteristics as bagel dough: they can withstand the heat of cooking, and are relatively stable in atmosphere at room temperature for extended periods of time. These materials are either mixed into bagel dough or coated onto bagels prior to baking. Cream cheese, in contrast, ages rapidly when exposed to air at room temperature, and is thus not a component of a conventional bagel.
Although bagels and cream cheese go together during consumption, bagels and cream cheese are very different chemically, and have different storage and handling requirements. Cream cheese is perishable, thermally sensitive, and easily contaminated, and is thus conventionally maintained in a chilled state until immediately prior to use. Pure cream cheese cannot be frozen and thawed without separation out of liquids and solids, nor can it be left exposed to air at room temperature for extended periods, nor can it be boiled in water or be subject to the high temperatures at which bagel dough is cooked. Thus, for reasons of product preparation as well as for reasons of food storage and handling, it would be counterintuitive to incorporate cream cheese into bagel dough prior to cooking.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,236,724 entitled "Filled Bagel Dough Product and Method" which issued to the present inventor was first to describe a technique by which cream cheese could actually be incorporated into a bagel dough shell. The invention was made under the assumption that cream cheese had to be protected from the high temperatures of baking, and thus had to be completely enclosed (hermetically sealed) within a bagel dough shell. The product was made by a relatively simple process wherein cream cheese was first completely encapsulated in a raw dough shell, the dough was allowed to rise, and the dough shell was boiled or steamed for a period of time sufficient to set the dough, though it was sometimes difficult to prevent the cream cheese filler from denaturing, boiling or becoming altered in texture or taste. The product was then baked to brown the crust. However, due to (1) the difficulty in shaping the product and (2) the difficulty in completely setting the dough without spoilage of the cream cheese, the product was limited to a bagel ball shape. While these bagel balls were new and unique, they were small in size and could not carry toppings.
The inventor continued his explorations and later discovered that by chilling or freezing the product prior to steaming or boiling, the cream cheese filler would be protected for a longer period of time as the product heated up from the outside in. The product could thus be formed into more diverse shapes which could be steamed or boiled for a time sufficient to set the dough, including forming a skin not only on the outer surface of the dough but also on the internal skin of the dough contacting the cream cheese. The underlying assumptions in all these processes were that (1) the dough shell must be of even thickness so that the dough is evenly exposed to heat and evenly sets, so that there are no regions of either raw or overcooked dough, and (2) the cream cheese must be protected from the steam or boiling water used in setting the dough, and is protected by the combination of chilling the cream cheese core and by the thermal insulative properties of the dough shell.
However, a problem remains with respect to displaying the merchandise. A product which contains a cream cheese filling has the same outward appearance as a conventional bagel article. The vendor must either cut open an example bagel for display purposes, which leads to waste, particularly if one of each type of bagel is to be displayed, or provide some form of visual advertisement attempting to draw attention to the product.
It would thus be advantageous to have a bagel product wherein the cream cheese filling is exposed in the final product. The conventional handling instructions on cream cheese packages, however, instruct that cream cheese is to be kept refrigerated and not frozen. Considering the sensitivity of cream cheese to the heat and steam which are essential to the cooking of the dough, it is difficult to envision a process by which an exposed cream cheese product could be produced. In fact, until the present invention, great care had been taken in the production of cream cheese filled dough products to ensure that the cream cheese was completely enclosed in dough, in order to avoid problems of leakage or denaturing of the cream cheese. Further, considering the inability to freeze most or all types of cream cheese, it is an object of the invention to produce a combination cream cheese and dough product which can be frozen for shipment or storage, and in which the cream cheese, once thawed, has the feel and taste of fresh cream cheese.
There is a need for a product which is attractive in appearance, easily and economically produced, and conveniently consumed as a snack item.
There is also a need for a bite-sized product which can be economically shaped, steamed, optionally partially browned, and frozen on a large scale, and shipped to retailers for final browning and serving.